Qibla direction in Wad Madani

How to face the Qibla in Wad Madani

Stand where you will pray and find north first. Then turn towards north and move a further 39.6° towards east: the result is the bearing of 39.6°. Because the angle sits far from the cardinal points, a rough guess such as “north” would be off by more than 30°, which is why a measured bearing matters in Wad Madani.

Scholars agree that someone who can see the Kaaba must face it exactly, while someone far away faces its direction (jihat al-Ka‘bah) as precisely as reasonably possible. The simplest check in Wad Madani is a local mosque: its mihrab and prayer lines already point to the Qibla. See the mosques of Wad Madani. At home, mark the direction once with tape or a small arrow so the whole family prays the same way.

Why a flat map shows a different direction

On a flat (Mercator) map, the straight line from Wad Madani to Mecca points to 40.5°, only 0.9° away from the true Qibla. Here the two methods practically agree, so a map gives a usable first idea, although the 39.6° bearing remains the exact one.

The angle on this page is the initial bearing of the great circle from 14.4012° N, 33.5199° E to the Kaaba (21.4225° N, 39.8262° E). It is the method used by mosque architects and by every serious Qibla calculator, and it gives one exact answer for each point on Earth.

Distance from Wad Madani to Mecca and Medina

Mecca is 1,027 km from Wad Madani as the crow flies, and Medina, the city of the Prophet ﷺ, is 1,288 km away. The distance is short enough that many pilgrims from Wad Madani travel to the Hijaz by road.

Clocks in Wad Madani run 1 hour behind Mecca all year. Prayer times, however, depend on the sun at your own location, so always use the prayer times of Wad Madani rather than those of Mecca.

Finding the Qibla with the sun in Wad Madani

On 107 days of 2027, the sun passes exactly through the Qibla direction of Wad Madani while it is well above the horizon. At that moment, facing the sun means facing Mecca. The effect is most frequent in May (31 days); for example, on 1 May 2027 it happens at 11:41 local time.

On 257 days the sun stands exactly opposite the Qibla: then the shadow of any vertical object, a pole, a door frame or a plumb line, points straight towards Mecca. This is most frequent in January (31 days), for instance on 1 January 2027 at 13:54.

Twice a year the sun passes directly over the Kaaba, on 28 May 2027 and 16 July 2027. Both moments are in daylight in Wad Madani: at 11:18 and 11:27 local time, face the sun and you face the Qibla exactly, anywhere in the city.

Wad Madani compared with other cities

Compared with Khartoum, 166 km away, the Qibla in Wad Madani is turned 9.0° further anticlockwise (39.6° against 48.6°), and Mecca is 18 km farther away. The nearest city with its own Qibla page, Al Manāqil (60 km), prays towards 41.2°, a difference of 1.6°.

Across the 18 cities in Sudan on this site, the Qibla ranges from 27.8° in Ad-Damazin to 61.9° in Geneina, a spread of 34.1°. That is too large to use one national direction, so each city has its own bearing.

See all cities on the Qibla page for Sudan.

Qibla in cities near Wad Madani

• Al Manāqil41.2° · 60 km
• Sennar36.3° · 93 km
• Singa33.4° · 146 km
• Kūstī38.6° · 166 km
• Khartoum48.6° · 166 km
• Gedaref29.2° · 205 km